Ambition

“Sometimes I wonder about my life. I lead a small life – well, valuable, but small – and sometimes I wonder, do I do it because I like it or because I haven’t been brave?” 

- Norah Ephron, You’ve Got Mail

James Dean is buried in Fairmount, Indiana. There’s a poetic incongruity to the site. James Dean is one of the most iconic actors in history – widely respected and deeply beloved. Over sixty years after his death, his grave is still littered with gifts, flowers, and lipstick kisses. His life was big. Fairmount, on the other hand, is small. It’s a farming community with a population under three thousand. As I drive through, I see boys learning to mow the lawn and girls riding dirt bikes. It’s small town America, where everyone knows each other and no one is too big for their britches.

I’m drawn to both ideals. I have always rebelled against the mediocre and the ordinary. Since I can remember, my ego has felt destined for something special. My search for immortality has taken me almost three thousand miles between New York City and Los Angeles and back again. But every time I drive through Fairmount with its candy store, library, and handful of small churches, I want this too: the small life. Rooted in community, raising a family, reading books. It is irresistibly peaceful and content – the greener grass promising release from the weight and suspense of my ambition.

What is your ambition: a big life impacting the masses or a small life of family and honest work? 

1 Thessalonians 4:11 says, “Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, minding your own business and working with your hands.” This is also a poetic incongruity; the combination of ambition and quiet life. The Ancient Words are always telling us the small life is the big life: 

“Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.”

“Whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant.”

“The last shall be first, and the first last.”*

James Dean died at twenty-four having made three movies. Maybe his life was small. I knew an old farmer who embodied a deeper level of humanity than anyone else I’ve ever met. Maybe his life was big. 

It’s probably no concern of ours. How big our lives become is largely beyond our control. How big our lives are compared to someone else’s is certainly none of our business. We each have a path to walk and our job is to walk it well. What comes of it and how it fits into the bigger Story is up to God to decide.

It’s easy to suggest one ideal is the universal goal: everyone should make it their ambition to do this or that. But it’s not the same for everyone. Some are called to pursue Hollywood dreams and others to farm the Indiana soil. Many born into dire circumstances do not have the luxury of options at all. 

But for all of us, wherever we find ourselves, our job is to do what has been put before us to do. May this be our ambition, to do it fully and with grateful hearts.

J. 

*Matthew 18:4, 20:26, and 20:16

Jan. 9, 2023